Suspect arrested after high-speed car chase that began at the Burlington Mall

Monday

Aug 11, 2014 at 8:27 PMAug 12, 2014 at 10:05 AM

Shots were fired during a police pursuit and crash near the Town Common Monday evening.Burlington Police Chief Michael Kent, in a press conference held at 9:10 p.m. this evening that a police officer on routine patrol duty at the Burlington mall observed a white minivan that was running and parked in a handicapped parking space. The officer ran the license plates through a database and found the plates did not match up with the vehicle. As the officer approached the driver, the driver (and only person in the van) fled the officer by driving away at a fast speed, leaving the mall parking lot and driving down Mall Road. The officer called the incident in at 7:02 p.m.Burlington police officers in police cruisers awaited the white minivan at the juncture of Mall and Cambridge Road by blocking access, where the suspect rammed one of the police cruisers to gain entry onto Cambridge Street/Route 3A, headed northbound. A police officer in a cruiser blocked the southbound lane of Cambridge Street to apprehend the vehicle, which was being driven erratically and at approximately 80 miles an hour on a heavily trafficed 35-mile-speed-limit-road. The suspect then drove in a path that would have hit the cruiser or the officer, and the officer shot a gun two times and no one was hit. The suspect in the minivan then crashed into two oncoming vehicles and fled the minivan on foot and ran into the wooded area of Simonds Park, which is Burlington's most popular park for families and children that is located across from the Town Common, at which time the suspect was apprehended and arrested. The suspect has been identified as Robert D. Haught Jr., age 42, of College Park, Maryland. He was arrested after crashing a white minivan on Cambridge Street near Center Street. He has been charged with:• Assault with Intent to Murder• Attempted Murder• Assault and Battery with a Dangerous Weapon• Leaving the scene of a motor vehicle accident with property damage• Leaving the scene of a motor vehicle accident with personal injury (two counts)• Failure to stop for police• Attaching plates• Marked lanes violations• Speeding• Reckless operationAdditionally, police saw, in plain view, a stack of credit cards and several high-end boxed electronics in the minivan when HAUGHT was arrested. Police suspect that HAUGHT was involved in a credit card fraud operation. Police are seeking a warrant to search the vehicle, and additional charges may be forthcoming.Of the two vehicles hit by the suspect, one contained an adult and two children; the adult was brought to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The children were unharmed. The driver of the second vehicle hit, and only passenger, was not hurt. An eyewitness told Wicked Local Burlington the shots rang out by Simonds Park, near the Town Common. The witness reported he saw seven or eight police cruisers speed down Cambridge Street, or Route 3A, then surround the Bank of America at the corner of Cambridge/Center streets. He heard two shots fired. The crowded park emptied almost immediately, the witness said.Police have not said who fired the shots.Cambridge Street was closed between the Bedford and Center streets intersection, in both directions, while police investigated.